Date : Sunday , 10 June 2012
Timings : 4pm – 7pm.
Venue : Shahi Dawat Restaurant
Most of us in Mumbai will know that the police is carrying out a crackdown on the city’s nightlife. Lead by the hockey stick wielding ACP Vasant Dhoble, bars and clubs have been raided, licenses revoked and patrons arrested and subjected to forcible blood testing for drugs.
To help make some sense of this issue GB is organising a special meet on Partying & Policing where we’ll be getting Vijay Hiremath, a lawyer with long experience of dealing with the police in Mumbai and also helping the lgbt community, to speak. Vijay has done Know-Your-Rights workshops for us in the past, but this will be with special emphasis on parties. We will also be inviting other party organisers to come and share their experiences and suggestions.
So for example we’ll be looking at this fabled liquor permit that the police keep using as an excuse to arrest those who don’t have it. We’ll look at how to get it and how having it can help. We’ll look at what the rights of people in a club are and what the police can and can’t do if they suspect you of committing immoral behaviour – and what is immoral behaviour anyway (in legal terms at least).
There are a great many laws involved here from the Bombay Police Act to laws against immoral trafficking and narcotics which can all get invoked in such situations. We’ll share experience of what has happened to people and how taking simple precautions and ways of dealing with the police can help avoid problems.
In fact, this is something we want to stress – this meet is NOT about coming into conflict with the police. We fully recognise there are real problems involved with parties that the police need to take care of and we welcome and support their efforts to deal with such real problems. But in the process a lot of time and effort can get wasted that can just be avoided by simply knowing what procedures to follow and how we can work with the police.
So this is really meant to be a constructive meeting to help ensure that queer parties in Mumbai can continue in safe ways, creating important spaces for the community here. So please do try and make a point of coming for this meeting which will be held at the Shahi Sawat restaurant at the City Centre mall in Mumbai Central, just east of the station.
